Things that would ensure I would never, *ever*, return to Noisebridge if I
were to see them there:
"people getting fucked on a table by a dildo"
Praveen, this is not as simple as an issue of "inclusion" and a happy
little collective. The truth of the matter is that when you include some
people, you cause others to feel threatened & unsafe and thereby exclude
them. People who are high at Noisebridge tend to cross boundaries, and one
of those boundaries is often *the bodily autonomy of women at the space. *San
Francisco is *full* of places where people can go to see folks screw in
public, Noisebridge does not need to be one of them. If you want to
display your bondage technology, go to Wicked Grounds! If you want to get
high in public, go to Dolores Park! The place full of collectively owned
powertools is not the correct venue for those activities.
On Sat, Apr 5, 2014 at 7:17 AM, Al Sweigart <asweigart at gmail.com> wrote:
> Your forgot "dropping acid at the space" and "condoning others to do the
> same" on that list, Praveen.
>> While everyone else talks about problems in the space and practical ways
> to solve these problems, you'd rather steer the conversation away from that
> and towards the problems of the world. WE CAN SOLVE BOTH AT THE SAME TIME.
> Not using Noisebridge as a homeless shelter doesn't mean we must give up
> fighting gentrification. In fact, Noisebridge could be even more effective
> at solving those problems if it didn't drive people away with its
> reputation as a filthy, rodent-infested space where you can buy meth and
> the people who steal from you aren't banned.
>>> On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 7:33 PM, Praveen Sinha <dmhomee at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> The idea of noisebridge as an entity being constrained by leases and
>> zoning laws is one that is frequently bandied about.
>>>> Indeed, in some amount of time, our lease will be up for re-negotiation,
>> at which point we may have to make our own hard decisions of whether we can
>> afford a rent increase, or be zoned for the next block of luxury housing in
>> the mission.
>>>> To me, a community is much more powerful than mere contracts or money -
>> in fact, it is the community itself that defines both of these things. To
>> me, a community (and movements in general) is most powerful when everyone
>> has an ability to participate. A lot of my off-time work is trying to deal
>> with circumstances of people on the margins of participation: often times
>> people who have lived their whole lives with a world that expects to
>> apologize for they are. I'll write more on that later. We are all
>> experiencing the first hand pains and momentous task of forming and growing
>> a community.
>>>> We have options to take on both our lease and our zoning. It would
>> require landlord buy-in, and it would require pulling connections inside
>> the city: both of these are doable - as an example, many of you may know
>> my housing collective has been working with the San Francisco Land Trust (
>>http://www.sfclt.org/ ) to save our house from getting converted into a
>> condoplex (and I highly encourage other people living in large collectives
>> to look into this).
>>>> We in the tech community in the bay area are blessed with a lot of
>> political power and influence: and this doesn't just mean twitter or
>> google. Not only do we have observers from around the world, but we have
>> observers and friends in city hall watching from a distance. As chaotic
>> and disenfranchised we may think of ourselves, in reality we all wield a
>> tremendous amount of influence as noisebridgers: we just don't know it yet
>> (and this pattern of internalized political disenfranchisement is common
>> not just amongst nerds but across many communities).
>>>> So what does all of this have to do with our tiny collective? Our
>> kitchen issues? Our disorganized circuit equipment? In the span that I've
>> been at noisebridge, I've seen and participated in: people adding new
>> senses in their bodies, people writing the next generation machine
>> recognition software, people making next generation low cost printable
>> circuits, people making at home gene amplification technology, people grow
>> mushrooms on a wall, people getting fucked on a table by a dildo and
>> spanked by bondage clowns, having knock down intersectional fights of race
>> and gender, being a technological staging ground for the occupy protests,
>> having our hacker home double up as a shelter for years at a time and still
>> function. We are creating and challenging the bounds of what can be done
>> and is possible and not just technologically but socially.
>>>> In that, I submit that our pains have not to do with mismanagment, but
>> that we need to grow into our next phase for an even larger and more
>> dynamic community: I don't know what it's going to look like or what the
>> outcome will be, but as everyone is shuffling about in this latest re-org,
>> I think it's important to think bigger and more radical and more creative
>> and more inclusive. As a hackerspace, we can go in directions no other
>> space or collective on the planet is capable of at the moment. Keep it
>> mind as we fight our battles, whatever side of drama you wind up on.
>>>> Love,
>> Praveen
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net>>https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss>>>>>> _______________________________________________
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